Surprisingly, this is only the 3rd book I’ve read by Jonathan Kellerman and/or his son Jesse Kellerman.

I enjoyed it. This is the 5th book in the Clay Edison series.

Crime Scene (2017)
A Measure of Darkness (2018)
Half Moon Bay (2020)
The Burning (2021)
The Lost Coast (2024)

I only downloaded because The Lost Coast is a terrific hike in California. 😀 … Unfortunately, there’s only one short day hike in the novel.

It’s been almost a year since Clay Edison was forced out of his job at the coroner’s bureau.

Now he’s on his own, working as a private eye.

When a client brings him a fraud case, Clay dives into a decades-old scheme targeting the vulnerable.

His investigation leads him to a bizarre town buried in the remote California wilderness. The residents don’t care much for outsiders. They certainly don’t like Clay asking questions. And they’ll do just about anything to shut him up.

I liked the missing person plot — it kept me guessing.

And I was charmed by the refreshingly simplistic writing style. Unpretentious.

The first half of the book was all good. The second half dragged a bit. Could have been shorter.